A Customer Portal: Right Solution for Business or Not?

‘Self-service’. The phrase itself means to serve yourself or to help yourself. That’s where the idea of a customer portal comes from. If you are a business that wants to provide 24*7 customer support without extending working hours or without hiring more support executives, then this is the tool you are looking for.

A customer portal is a single point of interaction between customers and business. Let’s see how effective can a customer portal can be:

The obvious benefit of a customer portal or a self-service portal for your business is the convenience it provides. Both to your business as well as your customers.

If we talk about customers, the popular opinion is that they prefer the self-service option rather than having to have long & tedious human interaction. It helps to get faster solutions, and they don’t have to visit a brick and mortar store. This is why the best option is to provide your customers with online customer portal solutions.

If we were to think based on the various industries of business, healthcare, finance, real estate, banking, education, etc. all benefit greatly from the customer portal solutions. It has made operations more efficient, and it helps provide round the clock services. It is a simple solution that integrates seamlessly into the user experience. It is an effective option to serve your customers properly & if this option is not there, customers experience hindrance in accessing services.

Now the question is, does your business need a portal?

Read on to find out.

Customers Demand Self Service
These days customers’ demand for self-service has increased. And it becomes a preferred method for them to interact with any business. They don’t prefer email or call support for their queries. They want their answers online by FAQs and knowledge base. Customers always find it much easier to find answers themselves rather than wait for a reply from a support executive.

Here are some facts regarding self-service which will back our statements:

According to Superoffice Blog:
40% of consumers now prefer self-service over human contact
70% of customers now expect a company’s website to include a self-service application.
Self-service can reduce costs by as much as $11 per call
Customer portal enables the self-service option for your customers.

Increase the Productivity of Support Staff
Time management is the biggest challenge for all businesses. The support teams spend most of their time in solving repetitive queries. This decreases their productivity, and it’s a waste of resources.

The ticketing system of self-service portal reduces the workload of agents. Customer portal saves time and provides automation for routine and repetitive tasks. So your customer service representatives concentrate on other important tasks. Thus, a CRM customer portal provides maximum customer satisfaction and increases the productivity of your sales and support team.

Role-Based Accessibility
A customer portal is basically you sharing your CRM with your customers. Now, a CRM contains a lot of sensitive data and sharing all of that data with customers is not a good idea at all. A good CRM customer portal comes with role-based accessibility where you can restrict the information you share with your customers. They will only be able to see the modules to which you’ve given the permissions.

Single and Secure Sign In
Lately, awareness of cyber and data security has increased. If a business is seen being lax about security, they are written off by people. A CRM customer portal takes care of secure sign in for you. It does not fetch any data from the database, but simply gives a secure interface where users can log in using the credentials they have. Only verified users will have access to the portal.

Cost Effective:
A customer portal is inherently cost effective because it helps reduce the time that your support staff spends on repetitive tasks and queries. This way you don’t even need to have a very large support staff. It also helps to retain your customer with clever customer servicing. And a loyal customer is, of course, good for business.

So, what do you think? Can a portal add value to your business? If yes, then find a company that can build you a proper customer portal keeping your business use cases in mind.

Wrapping it up...
These are the main reasons why you should consider offering a customer portal to your customers. There are a lot of companies that offer customer portal development, as well as services to customize it according to your needs. You can find a good company that designs customer portals, make sure they have a good portfolio and pick the right one.

Author Resource:-
Mr. Maulik Shah is the founder & CEO of CRMJetty, hub of innovative customer relationship solutions, provides ready to CMS integrate portal solutions for various CRM, including customer portal solutions. Maulik is a tech enthusiast and writes about the various aspects of ecommerce technology.